Eligibility and registration
There are two official age groups: pre-university, and university. Anyone who qualifies for the next IPhO qualifies also for the pre-university age group. All BSc and MSc students of any university qualify for the university age group.
To register, please fill this form: Physics Cup 2025
If you cannot access the registration link due to country-specific restrictions, please send your registration data (full name, date of birth, e-mail address, country, school or university, age group (university/pre-university), physics teacher (if pre-university) by email to physcs.cup@gmail.com.
Publication of the problems, hints, and results
Problems and Hints are published on Sundays at 13:00 GMT. Once a problem has been published, the first hint will be posted two weeks later, on a Sunday at 13:00 GMT. After that, a new Hint will be added every Sunday until there are no more Hints left. Intermediate results will be published on a weekly basis, every Sunday at 13:00 GMT. Solutions will be accepted up to two weeks after the last Hint is published. Sometimes the final deadline for a problem is extended, such extensions will be announced together with the intermediate results. Faster solutions and solutions submitted before hints are posted will receive higher scores, see below. The final results for each problem will be published within a couple of weeks of the final deadline.
Submitting the solutions
All solutions are to be sent by email to physcs.cup@gmail.com. Please use the subject line “Problem No 1” (“Problem No 2”, etc), exactly as written here; the phrase “Problem No” anywhere within the subject line triggers an automatic reply confirming your submission. You are advised to submit the answer as fast as you can, but not later than the final deadline of the problem (usually around 7 weeks from the publication). Since there is a speed bonus, you can first submit only the answer. In that case, you need to submit a full solution within the next 48 hours (failing to do so invalidates your answer-only submission).
Accepted formats
LaTeX, PDF, MsWord, jpg. You can scan (or take a photo) of your hand-written solution, or write it in LaTeX (recommended) or MsWord. You can produce also a semi-LaTeX text – a simple text file/e-mail using LaTeX syntax for formulae (e.g. m=m_0/\sqrt{1-v^2/c^2}).
Grading (Updated October 21, 2024)
Each problem has an initial base score of 1.0 points if no hints are published by the submission time. For every published hint, the base score is reduced by 0.1. This base score can be further modified by bonuses or penalties.
Every Sunday, competitors are notified if their solutions are:
- Correct,
- Almost correct (minor mistakes like a typo affecting a numeric factor), or
- Incorrect.
A correct solution receives the base score. If your solution is incorrect, you may continue submitting corrections until all errors are fixed. However, each “almost correct” solution results in a penalty factor of 0.95, and each incorrect solution incurs a penalty factor of 0.9. If you identify and correct your mistake before receiving a notification, the penalty is smaller: 0.97 for an “almost correct” solution and 0.95 for an incorrect one.
Bonus Points:
The first 10 correct solutions (later supplemented with a complete solution) receive a bonus according to the formula 1.1−n0.1 where n is the order of submission (starting from 1). The overall best solution earns an additional bonus of 1.0 points and will be published as the official solution on the website. If there are multiple “best solutions,” the bonus may be shared (e.g., two equally good solutions would each receive a 0.5 bonus). Other good solutions that deserve publication, such as those using significantly different approaches, will also be published and receive a bonus of 0.1.
To improve your chances of having your solution published, it is important to document it well and write it clearly (preferably in LaTeX, though a good scan of a clean handwritten solution is acceptable).
Penalty Cap:
For those who submit many incorrect solutions before finding the correct one, if the total score (after applying all penalties and bonuses) falls below 0.35, the final score will be capped at 0.35.
Publication of results, awards and diplomas
The names and results of the students with the best scores are published on the web page; the list is updated weekly, on Sundays. Diplomas will be sent by e-mail. Everyone who has solved correctly at least one problem will get a certificate of a successful participation. Platinum, gold and silver awards (thermos flasks with Physics Cup logo) will be distributed either through EuPhO/IPhO participants and team leaders, or if that deems to be impossible, by mail. Bronze awards (T-shirts with Physics Cup logo) will be distributed either through EuPhO/IPhO participants and team leaders; if that does not work out, you can get your T-shirt whenever you (or friend of yours) happen to visit TalTech.
What you need to derive and what you donʼt need to derive in your solutions: you can use the basic formulae related to the topics of IPhO Syllabus without proof, but everything which goes beyond that needs to be derived.